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Tom Kerwick challenged my warnings by claiming that the observed longevity of white dwarfs, in spite of the constant bombardment by cosmic rays, provides a convincing safety argument regarding the currently running nuclear collisions experiment at CERN. This claim is important but, unfortunately, inconclusive as I shall try to demonstrate.

It is true that the collisions performed at CERN are relatively meager compared to cosmic-ray energies. The current, approximately 10 TeV collisions between equal-momentum particles at CERN correspond to 10.000 TeV cosmic ray protons hitting a stationary proton on earth or a white dwarf. The thousand-fold increase is a consequence of the relativistic energy-momentum law being applicable.

If 10.000 TeV (= 10 to the 16 electron volt) look like much, cosmic ray energies up to 10 to the 22 electron volt (a million times more) have been measured. However, if the latter are translated back into symmetric collisions of the CERN type, they are “only” a thousand times more energetic than CERN’s (owing to the square-root rule implicit in the mentioned law).

The fact that white dwarfs appear to be resilient to this bombardment is living proof that the cross section of CERN-generated miniature black holes (as well as their up to a thousand times more massive cosmic-ray generated analogs) must be minuscule. Specifically, their diameter must lie below that of a lepton (electron or quark). While an electron’s diameter is often supposed to be zero, neutrino absorption in solid matter yields a finite value (about ten to the negative 24 meter). In addition, the Telemach theorem guarantees a non-zero electron diameter.

So far, the cosmic rays cannot be shown not to be generating ultra-fast miniature black holes. When generated, the latter need to be rare enough not to leave a black hole get stuck inside the white dwarf in question. Otherwise white dwarf stars would no longer exist, as Tom stresses. The difference between earth and a white dwarf lies in the latter’s by 5 orders of magnitude higher density. It renders the white dwarf by so many orders of magnitude more vulnerable to ultra-fast natural black holes. Hence we have 3 numbers which jointly limit the lifespan of white dwarfs: The collision rate of CERN-like (or stronger) cosmic rays impinging on their surface; the fraction of these events leading to the formation of a black hole; and the free path length of an ultrafast miniature black hole inside white-dwarf matter.

None of these three parameters is currently known. Nevertheless as long as the black hole is markedly smaller than a lepton, it is the latter’s diameter alone that determines the cross section. Therefore, it is possible to draw a conclusion: White-dwarf longevity is limited by cosmic rays if the energy of the latter (CERN size or larger) suffices to generate black holes. In this case, “very old” white dwarfs cannot exist. This is a testable prediction.

The cooling rate of white dwarfs happens to be very low owing to their minuscule surface-to-mass ratio. Our cosmos is currently assumed to be only 14 billion years old (about the age of globular star cluster in our galaxy). Ultra-old white dwarfs should not be observable for that reason alone. As it happens, the new prediction is theory-independent, however. Ultra-old cold white dwarfs are therefore worth looking for empirically. If they are found, two important implications follow: (i) our universe is older than generally anticipated; (ii) the LHC experiment is safe. If, on the other hand, ultra-old white dwarfs prove empirically absent, this fact confirms the big bang theory at face value. However, if the recent theory of cryodynamics holds true (which implies a very much larger age of the universe), a measured absence of ultra-old white dwarfs implies that cosmic rays produce white-dwarf eating black holes. In that case, there is a high probability that the LHC is currently producing earth-eating black holes.

Therefore an astronomical test of the safety of the LHC experiment, based on white dwarf longevity, exists. The same claim was made by Tom. The difference lies alone in the fact that he assumes that the collision rate of micro black holes with leptons is much higher (due to a higher lepton diameter being apparently assumed). This difference led him to predict a very much shorter lifespan for white dwarfs. Since that prediction is defied by observation, his conclusion was that CERN is safe.

It will be important for everyone to learn if Tom Kerwick (perhaps in conjunction with Giddings and Mangano whom he quotes) can defend his prediction of a much higher collision rate with leptons for ultrafast natural mini-black holes inside white dwarfs. If so, CERN can perhaps be exculpated for its public refusal to update its 4-year-old safety report while continuing at a nonlinearly increased collision rate.

I thank Henry Gebhardt, Boris Hagel and Tobias Muller for discussions. For J.O.R.

In it he reports on a gorilla in a cage who could be brought to phrenetic laughter by his human friend’s pretending to bite him into his toe. Quote: “If you have never seen a gorilla in a fit of laughter, I recommend searching out such a sight before you pass from this world.”

This is absolutely human behavior. If you know about the cross-caring theory, which explains how a young child interacting with his bonding partner is getting “moved” into suspecting benevolence shown towards him, then you realize that the same thing can be accomplished with a caged or non-caged gorilla.

I recently mentioned Margaret Howe, a pupil of my late friend Gregory Bateson’s. There are important insights about the mission of humankind on our planet and beyond (“galactic export”) that would make it a great pity if this “second level of human social evolution on earth and in the solar system” was going to be clipped.

I know I am being impossible, but finding outrageous things that tickle everyone in her or his heart so as to be moved is the real mission of science. I fantasize talking with a gorilla – or orangutan – about the long-stretched “toe” of the visualized Schwarzschild metric of a black hole, both of us laughing.

If you think dolphins are preferable, I shall not object. I found a proof recently, though, that orangutans have the most highly developed brain identified so far. The fact that the latter is lightweight owing to its carrier’s arboreal existence, does not detract from its functional superiority. The proof is based on the mathematics of the traveling salesman problem (second version).

Ray Kurzweil hopes we can build artificial brains of matching caliber soon – via the brain equation, I would add. But it would be fun to first make friends with our hardware-wise stronger natural relatives. Including – perhaps – giant octopuses and mantis shrimps ( http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=endscreen&NR=1&v=nKgStQ8Scs0 ).

Could CERN not make a tiny little break to admit a “safety-regained discussion” as it could be called in anticipation?

http://www.aljazeera.com/programmes/insidestory/2012/07/2012759585764599.html (at minutes 09:00-10:10, 11:00-12:03, 12:35-13:25, 16:08-17:13) gave me a world-wide forum again. The rest of the media and all colleagues of mine keep their mouths shut.

There is logic behind this schizophrenic world-wide attitude: In case the outlaw is right, one can later always claim that not the whole planet was part of the conspiracy of silence since one high-ranking international outlet reported. However, this strategy is not logical. For if I am right and the worst case materializes, the fig leaf will go under as well.

My class yesterday in which this riddle was touched upon in passing helped me see the mechanism: My results on black holes are too much advanced from the planet-wide accepted lore to be understandable to any colleague.

Imagine the “generic 3-pseudosphere.” Its lower-dimensional analog in ordinary 3-space, the 2-pseudosphere (the so-called Newton pseudosphere) looks like two trumpets with infinitely long, infinitely thinned-out mouth pieces, glued together head-on with their bells ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:The_Pseudosphere.jpg ). This smooth monster has the same volume as a sphere of the same (maximal) diameter, and also the same surface area and the same (if negative) curvature: a kind of miracle. Hence the name “pseudo-sphere.”

By cutting it in the middle to take only one half of it, and then making the trumpet generic by giving it a non-zero asymptotic radius – the Schwarzschild radius – at its infinitely far-away tip (and adding one dimension), you get the correct reality of the space surrounding a black hole. Although there is beautiful related work by Yu Tian at al. ( http://arxiv.org/pdf/hep-th/0411004.pdf ), this is beyond the heads of the whole community. They simply cannot follow.

My late friend Benoit Mandelbrot created a storm with the opposite insight – that there are compact finite volumes with an infinite surface area. In the present dual case, the little ant on the flat outer rim of the trumpet, headed for the middle, cannot believe that the way towards the latter (the so-called “horizon”) is infinitely long. No one saw this before.

But this is “art for art’s sake,” is it not? No: this is physics. And, strangely, the survival of the planet hinges on a single person of public clout believing me.

Thank you, everyone, for kindly having bent your mind.

The whole within which we find ourselves at every conscious moment is a miraculous gift that we take for granted in our culture. Everything can be understood inside the world, so we believe in science – except for the qualia (like color) and also for the Now which both are non-existent in physics (although this is almost never mentioned).

For 4 days now, something that unlike the qualia and the Now exists within rather than outside the scope of science is just as baffling: the Higgs field. As Matt Strassler explained two years ago, the everywhere constant Higgs field is responsible for the masses of all elementary particles – without an exchange of particles being involved — provided it will be discovered experimentally via the signature of a first field-specific particle. Thus an immutable constant influence makes itself felt inside creation for 4 days. The freshly discovered Higgs particle can be called the first unmistakable miracle found in nature, because it reflects the presence of an everywhere constant field of unknown origin.

The discovery comes with a price tag which is none of its own fault. The machine made to find it was designed so as to also generate a second totally new animal in the hope that at least one of the two would be found: miniature black holes. The latter have eluded finding so far we are told, but this is not certain: a double success cannot be excluded.

This is because a trivial new implication of Einstein’s “happiest thought” of 1907 revealed that black holes possess radically new properties. The latter cause black holes to arise much more readily and make them invisible to CERN’s detectors. In addition they grow exponentially inside matter. Therefore if one specimen gets stuck inside earth, the planet will be eaten inside out after an asymptomatic period of a few years, so as to assume the size of a chestnut while retaining its gravitational influence on the moon.

No one likes this new implication of relativistic physics, published in the African Journal of Mathematics. In the current euphoria about the newly discovered Higgs miracle (a discovery planned to be made more significant by doubling the cumulative collision number during the remainder of the year 2012), there is no chance anyone will waste a thought on this unrelated second possible success of the LHC experiment. Hence no one cares about the new “safety report,” overdue after 4 years, or about the “safety conference” kindly requested by a court on January 27, 2011. When the most illuminating finding of history is waiting to be investigated further, a second sensational effect has lost all interest even if not uplifting but maximally dreadful in character.

Only if Professor Higgs himself spoke up in favor of a brief break in the experiment before the planned doubling in luminosity, would humankind get a chance to have the still valid proof that the dream result achieved is accompanied by the worst nightmare of history, punctured before continuing.

I need to talk to Professor Higgs immediately to win his sympathy and support. Is someone kind enough to introduce me to him?

P.S.: My anonymous colleague Bernd and I discovered today that the Higgs field is (like mass and charge) subject to a locally imperceptible reduction proportional to the gravitational redshift valid relative to the distant stars.

I congratulate Peter Higgs. And I ask him to forgive me that I raised the “cost” issue in my Aljazeera interview of to date. Not the financial cost, but the cost incurred by humankind: The fact that the doubling of data planned for the rest of the year (up to the scheduled pause for upgrading) will once more double the risk that the planet will be shrunk into a 2-cm black hole after a few years’ delay.

This risk is presently at about 4 percent already. Doubling it is a nightmare – unless a counterproof can be found. Until this aim has been achieved, I herewith ask Peter Higgs to join me in bequeathing CERN for a brief stop until the “doubling of the danger” has been shown to be inconsequential: because the black holes, to which CERN’s sensors are blind by design according to the published proof, have been shown to be absent since the proof has been punctured. The best scientist of the planet may need only hours if we are all lucky.

So far, CERN refuses to address the 4-year-old issue that only grew in strength – by admitting a safety conference. No citizen of the planet understands this ostrich policy. Dear Peter Higgs: will you help us all? No one else on the planet can.